"Absolutely Insane": Pentagon Officials on Trump's Military Deportation Plan
Nick Turse
November 19 2024, 12:23 p.m.
Donald Trump campaigned on the promise of mass deportations, and on Monday, he said that his administration would use the U.S. military to carry out this expulsion of millions of people, many of whom have lived in America for years or even decades. The U.S. military historically has not conducted immigration enforcement and does not normally conduct law enforcement functions. But when Tom Fitton, president of the conservative group Judicial Watch, posted on social media that the next administration “will use military assets to reverse the Biden invasion through a mass deportation program,” Trump responded: “TRUE!!!”
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has already pursued the legal strategy of declaring the flow of immigrants an “invasion,” arguing that the federal government has failed in its constitutional duty to protect states from foreign powers and that Texas should have the right to use its National Guard as a deportation force. Republican lawmakers in Arizona have argued the same. Trump has also previously suggested he would rely on wartime powers to carry out his plan.
The Pentagon was publicly dismissive of Trump’s pledge to employ the military to conduct mass deportations. “The Department does not comment on hypotheticals or speculate on what may occur,” a Defense Department spokesperson told The Intercept. Behind the scenes, officials were exasperated. “It’s absolutely insane,” said one Pentagon official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak with the press on the matter. “I never thought I’d see the day when this was a ‘serious’ — put that in scare quotes — policy.” He said that the legal and logistical hurdles would be immense, and the proposal was “unrealistic and unserious.”
Another Defense Department official in a different office, who was also not authorized to speak with the press, had almost exactly the same reaction. “It’s insanity,” he said of Trump’s announcement. “On Day one I will launch the largest deportation program in American history to get the criminals out,” Trump said during a rally at Madison Square Garden in New York City in the final days of the presidential campaign. “I will rescue every city and town that has been invaded and conquered, and we will put these vicious and bloodthirsty criminals in jail, then kick them the hell out of our country as fast as possible.” In a prior campaign speech, Trump said his administration would follow “the Eisenhower model,” referencing a 1954 campaign, whose name was also an ethnic slur, to round up and expel Mexican immigrants: “Operation Wetback.” About 1 million Mexicans and even some Americans of Mexican descent were deported.
https://theintercept.com/2024/11/19/trump-deportation-plan-military/
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